


In Dreams

by ninhursag



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019), The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Ficlet, M/M, Purple Prose, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:28:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25391623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninhursag/pseuds/ninhursag
Summary: Alex Manes died in Iraq. It didn't take.The old guard crossover literally no one asked for.
Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes
Comments: 49
Kudos: 200





	In Dreams

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote a thing, which is nice!

Once there was a boy who became a soldier, who held death in his gun hand, steady and true. He was born in a desert and he died in one, screaming furiously, both times.

He didn't stay dead.

In the points between, choking on blood, ringing of the concussive blast in his ear, seeing but not feeling what used to be his foot before it got torn off his body, he dreamed starlight.

Starlight spilling out over everything, in universal spirals. Like spirals of curls spilling into his hands, sandy and soft, a tender smile hidden under…

He died seeing that smile, which wasn't so bad.

He woke up gasping, rocks and sand digging into his skin, blood flaking on his fatigues.

His foot was exactly where it was before the IED blasted it off. If it weren't for the blood he'd be pretty sure he dreamed it.

His XO was staring down at him, watery blue eyes red rimmed and too wide. "Captain Manes," he whispered. "Sir. Alex. What-- are you ok?"

Alex should have been deafened still, from the blast, but his hearing was fine. He was fine. Everything was…

"I must have been thrown clear," he said, inanely, like that made any kind of sense. There was blood, but he wasn't wounded. He wasn't wounded.

The stare he got in return was half horror.

**

He didn't have to guess that if he stayed put he was going to end up in a lab somewhere and he was not going to like it. 

The Airforce was his family's legacy but Alex had just died in a desert halfway around the world and he wasn't going to lie to himself about where this was going.

He ran before rescue arrived.

**

He took shelter in a little village where a man with kind eyes made him tea while making gestures against evil.

Alex's Arabic was a bad joke and he only knew what an Ifrit was from reading Neil Gaiman and being a general nerd, but he couldn't exactly argue the point because he couldn't be sure he wasn't a fucking Ifrit. No idea how this guy knew.

He slept on an uncomfortable pallet on the floor and dreamed of starlight and curls. He'd been dreaming that face for years, between home leaves. Sometimes smiling. Sometimes heavy lidded and inviting, parted lips and parted thighs. Sometimes bitter mouthed and round shouldered, turned away.

"Michael," Alex called the dream boy, dream man. In this dream those hazel brown eyes were narrow with concern.

"I'll come and get you," Michael Guerin said. "Where are you?"

"I'm not sure," Alex told him honestly. He was AWOL if he wasn't officially dead, in the Iraqi countryside with no ID. He was not exactly somewhere a civilian mechanic from New Mexico could come and get him. 

Michael laughed at him like he could hear him. "I'll come and get you anyway," he repeated. "I'm building a spaceship, why not take it on a test flight?"

Since this was a dream and no weirder than whatever other fucked up shit was going on in Alex's life he shrugged and smiled.

"Sure," he said. "I'll be here waiting."

After, he dreamed of a woman, ramrod backed and unsmiling, like a warrior. She looked him in the eye like she knew all about him.

He dreamed about two men who came at each other with an easy peace he longed for.

A man, alone and tired of it.

A Marine with gentle eyes.

Drowning, drowning, drowning.

There was a spaceship coming for him. He was pretty sure.

**

In the morning he walked out into the countryside before his host woke up. The sunrise was beautiful, almost homelike.

He heard the motorcycle before he saw it, and waited, head cocked, gun hand twitching.

The woman on it was helmetless, black hair gleaming in the sun. She lowered her sunglasses. She was right out of his dreams.

"I dreamed you," he told her. His mother's people probably had a story that could have made sense of that. Out of all of this. But he didn't know it. "Very spooky."

She grinned at him. "That's how it goes. You want to come with me and learn more?"

"Can't, I'm waiting for my ride." Hey if this dream was real, maybe Michael Guerin had a spaceship. Why wouldn't he?

Her eyebrows went up. "Your ride? Someone knows you're out here, kid?"

Alex shrugged. "I dreamed it, just like I dreamed you."

Her mouth curled but she nodded. After a moment she tossed him a water bottle. It was lukewarm but tasted good.

"What kind of ride--" the woman started to say but Alex had stopped paying attention. Something was coming over the horizon. Low flying in the sun, shining like a mirage in the dry air.

It was nothing the Airforce made. Nothing a human had made.

The woman whistled and shook her head. "Is that what it looks like?"

The spaceship landed, beautiful, like a star on the ground. Alex smiled. "Yeah," he said and strode forward into whatever came next.


End file.
